


advent court brew

by malevon



Category: Original Work
Genre: F/M, also lots of swearing, heated arguments, rated T because alcohol use?? so if that's not ur cup of tea, the in-laws am i right
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-24
Updated: 2018-09-24
Packaged: 2019-07-16 07:51:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16081721
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/malevon/pseuds/malevon
Summary: murdoc fulton gets deep into his cup.maryn fulton finds what she's been looking for.kharis crowe hates his father in-law.





	advent court brew

              If there was any skill he had developed over years of sailing alone and frequenting the many taverns around the continent, Murdoc Fulton had grown a knack for holding his alcohol.

 

              He was proud of it, too. It had become a way for him to make quick coin when his pockets were becoming dangerously thin. A quick wager against the most strapping bargoer with the most inflated ego was an easy way to both fill his pouches and make some quick enemies—or sometimes, even quick friends.

 

              Though, while he appreciated them, he made sure to never stay in one place for too long. He’d done that once before, and it had almost cost him what little career he had had left.

 

              Odd. The thoughts of a small port town in northern Vridel only ailed him when he was down into a bottle.

 

              Murdoc swirled the beer in his cup, the taste strong and still burning in his throat, characteristic of the Advent Court. Everything on this damned isle was illegal in some way, shape, or form on the mainland, so he had to enjoy what little he could before he sailed back.

 

              The tavern was quiet as he sat alone, but as the evening wore on, crowds began to file in. There were too many people for him to keep a watchful eye on all of them, and there was too much ale in his system for him to keep a watchful eye on just one. A few people recognized him, mentioning his name in passing, calling him things he’d heard before—he was a cheat, a fraud—but they were mingled with the excited buzz that came from knowing that a professional drunkard was in their presence. He carved a reputation for himself, it seemed. That must mean it was time to go.

 

              “’Scuse me,” a voice said from behind him, softly, but loud enough just for Murdoc to hear in this crowded bar. He turned and was greeted by a tall man taking a seat beside him. The lights were fairly dim, but through his quickly blurring vision, Murdoc could see the man was plainly Taylvish, with a distinctive scar across the bridge of his nose. “Can I buy you a drink?” the man asked, and though he spoke the common tongue, it was stilted, and clearly eastern.

 

              “I’d appreciate that, my friend, if you can finish this one off. The brew here is a bit strong for my old bones.”

 

              “Is it now? You don’t look all that old, if I may.”

 

              The man signaled down the barkeep, a rough looking halfling woman with her hair in a tight bun, and placed an assortment of coins on the counter, asking for a simple tonic, something lighter. He turned to Murdoc again then, angling his body and resting one arm on the bar.

 

              “And what brings you here?” he asked, downing the rest of Murdoc’s drink in one gulp, though his face came back up sour and obviously displeased.     

 

              “Passage,” Murdoc answered simply, because it wasn’t exactly a lie.

 

              “To the Maw, or back to the mainland?”

 

              “To the mainland, I suppose.”

 

              The man hummed contemplatively, passing Murdoc the tonic that had come sliding down the counter towards them.

 

              “My business is done here. I ought to get back to Vridel sooner or later.”

 

              “Got someone waiting for you?” he asked, and Murdoc imagined a different note in his voice, but it could have been his accent, muddled in with the bustle of the tavern around them. The man glanced over Murdoc’s shoulder, but quickly returned his green-eyed gaze back to his own. Murdoc would have found these actions suspicious if he wasn’t just a tinge drunk.

 

              “Not much of anything is waiting for me anywhere, I’m afraid,” Murdoc said, a bit sadly, and took a sip of the tonic. Even the simple mixture sent a tingling feeling into his stomach, and the drink itself was impossibly cold, almost frozen.

 

              “Not much of anything, huh?” the man mused, in a voice just barely loud enough for Murdoc to hear. A chill went up his spine, and suddenly, he was being lifted into the air by the scruff of his neck.

 

              “You lying _rat_ ,” the man growled, and Murdoc, even through his muffled hearing, could hear it clear as day.

 

              And then he was on the ground, struggling for air, the sounds of the surprised patrons sounding all too far away. He was _freezing_.

 

              It had been a while since Murdoc had been punched with such a force. He pushed himself upright, his breath coming in stuttered heaves, and creaked open his eyes, the world blurry in front of him. Dialogue came to him in fragments.

 

              “—what have I _told you_ about—”

 

              “—don’t understand— _who he is—”_

“— _matter?_ You don’t just—”

 

              And then there were hands on his shoulders, and he could hear the man’s voice offer a very cautionary “ _Maryn.”_

 

              Murdoc’s eyes shot open then, and the face that greeted his confirmed the fear that had risen in his heart. “Mar--?” he said around a slight cough, air still trying to make its way back into his lungs. His daughter looked at him, her eyes burning, and something flashed in them that was hard for Murdoc to pin. She whipped around to face the man that had punched him.

 

              “Have you lost your _goddamn mind?”_ she spat, and the man threw his hands up in surrender. “Did you _know_? Do you _know_ who you just punched?”

 

              “How could I not?” the Taylvish man responded flippantly, as if he had no care for Maryn’s anger. “You two look exactly alike.”

 

              She turned back to face Murdoc, the anger quickly dissolving from her flaming gaze, and she helped him to his feet. She was so _tall._ She had her mother’s sharp, angular eyes, but the man was right, everything else about her was the spitting image of himself. The notion made a lump quickly form in his throat.

 

              Maryn noticed him staring at her and scoffed, her complexion quickly turning as red as her hair. “We need to be—not in here.” She took Murdoc’s arm in her grip and started to lead him towards the door, but she stopped after taking a couple of steps, turning to face someone behind her and glaring. “You—stay here for a little bit. Try not to _punch_ anyone else.”

 

              Behind him, Murdoc could hear a frustrated sigh, and then he was being hauled out of the tavern by his daughter, whom he had not seen in upwards of fifteen years.

 

              They walked in silence, her legs carrying them in long strides. He felt like he should say something, apologize, anything. When they were a respectable distance from the tavern, Maryn sputtered and beat him to it.

 

              “I’m sorry—about—about Kharis. He’s—I don’t know what got into him.” Her voice had deepened since he last heard her speak—which to be fair, was to be expected, but something about it made Murdoc feel very old.

 

              “Oh, Maryn, please. He knows how to throw a punch. It’s a good quality to have.”

 

              She laughed lightly, and the sound sobered Murdoc. His heart ached.

 

              Maryn lead him into an inn down the street from the tavern, taking him up the stairs to a room on the second floor, and she procured a key from one of her pouches and opened the door. The room was quaint, with two beds on opposite walls, a window, and various belongings strewn about—Murdoc noticed one of the beds had a heavy blue cloak folded near the foot, there was a sword resting against one of the corners, and there were miscellaneous bags thrown onto the table in the middle of the room.

 

              Maryn claimed the bed without the cloak, sitting with her legs crossed. She pinned Murdoc with those eyes that made him miss the lighthouse where he spent entirely too much time, and he felt her gaze on him as he sat down on the bed opposite her.

 

              “Did you know I’ve spent almost ten years looking for you?” she asked in a voice that sounded more like the Maryn that he knew, which was to say, a very young child. “Ten years and you’re just—you’re here now, and I don’t know…”

 

              She trailed off, looking around the room, averting her gaze to be anywhere but on Murdoc. Something about the fact made the lump in his throat return, and he put a hand to his chest, which he quickly retracted when it came back wet. His first thought was that he was bleeding, but when he looked down, he saw that his clothes were slightly damp around the area where that man—Kharis—had punched him.

 

              “He’s a glacae,” Maryn offered, and Murdoc looked up at her again. “Sorry, again.”

 

              “A glacae, indeed.”

 

              Silence took hold once more. Murdoc had never felt so trapped before. He used to talk to Maryn for hours, weaving stories out of reality and fiction, but he doubted the woman sitting before him would accept anything he had to offer anymore. He decided to tread on grounds that they were both familiar with.

              “Who is he?”

 

              Maryn stifled a laugh. “He’s, uh—my first mate, in a way. He tried to assassinate me about three years ago.”

 

              Murdoc glossed over the latter half of that statement. “First mate, you say? You sail?”

 

              She beamed, and Murdoc mirrored her. “I do. By myself.”

 

              “ _By yourself!”_

“Yes!”

 

              “Tell me about her, your ship!”

 

              Maryn’s smile got brighter, and Murdoc’s heart weighed down heavier. She looked as if though he had broken a dam, behind which were things she had been dying to tell him about. She’d been looking for him for almost _ten years._ “Oh, Dad, she’s beautiful. Her name’s _The Gull._ She’s quick like one, light. She’s the best ship I could possibly have.”

 

              Murdoc laughed. “She sounds wonderful. Where’d you round up enough money for a vessel that amazing?”

 

              She leaned forward towards him, as if she were about to tell a secret when it was only the two of them in the room. “I _stole_ it,” she said, covering her mouth right after the words left it.

 

              “Maryn Lea Fulton!” Murdoc exclaimed, trying to be angry, but finding not a bit of anger in himself. He knew that he should feel angry, but, how could he?

 

              “I know, I know,” she laughed. “I stole it off a dock, which was why Kharis was actually hired to kill me, and it was just—”

 

              “Well, you’ve had quite an interesting few years, haven’t you?”

  
              “A bit, I’d say.”

 

              “Have you been back to Gulterdon? To see your mother?”

 

              And just like that, the dam in front of Maryn’s eyes was rebuilt. The bright gleam faded from her shoulders, from her smile, and she shrunk in on herself. “No.”

 

              “ _No?”_

              “No, I haven’t, okay?” Maryn looked at him, and Murdoc felt something in his heart twist. “I was so focused on finding you, so I just—I never went back. I settled in to adventuring and thieving, like you did—”

 

              “I didn’t steal, Maryn.”

 

              “Listen, I did what I had to do to get by, alright? I was thirteen.”

 

              Murdoc felt an anger that was unfamiliar to him. It felt hollow and sad, and when he tried to say anything, he found that no words would come to his lips. His eyes burned holes into Maryn, and she looked at him with wide eyes, her brows furrowed, and her teeth hooked on her bottom lip.

              “Listen, Dad, I have to—”

 

              “You left home when you were _thirteen_ , Maryn?”

 

              “Please don’t do this right now—”

 

              “Have you talked with Lena _at all?”_

 

              Maryn stood, holding up her hands defensively. “ _No, Dad, please_ let me—look, okay, can we talk when we’re both rational? Please? I’m going to go back to the tavern and get Kharis before he gets himself killed or thrown in jail, and then we can—then we can talk. Please. I can’t do this right now.”

 

              Murdoc stared for what felt like an eternity. He wanted nothing more than his daughter to stay, and for the two of them to go back to Gulterdon together and to see his wife again—he hadn’t wanted these things for years, but the sight of Maryn had reawakened something ancient in his heart, something that he had thought washed away with the burning sensation of Advent Court brew.

 

              As she turned to the door, she looked at him over her shoulder.

 

              “Please don’t leave again,” she said, and her voice was low.

 

              Murdoc nodded, his teeth grit, and he watched her go.

 

* * *

 

 

              Maryn didn’t know what to do with herself anymore.

 

              The streets were still relatively crowded, but Maryn still walked with her hands crossed across her chest. Normally, she would walk these streets with confidence oozing from her presence, but she didn’t know what defined her anymore—for the last ten years, her defining trait had been the search for her father, and now that she had completed it—in a sense—she didn’t know what to do. Her father wanted to go back home, but Maryn didn’t know how she felt about that, either. She didn’t know a lot of things.

 

              The tavern was quieter than when she had been in it not an hour before, and not to mention emptier; she was grateful to Kharis for obeying her in her moment of anger, her arms dropping from her chest when she saw him sitting at a booth, sipping at some kind of drink with his brow furrowed. She slumped down into the seat opposite him, ignoring his surprised glance as she snatched the drink from his hand, downing the rest of it in one go. The taste seared. She was not a big proponent of alcohol in general, much less from the Court.

 

              When she slammed the glass down, Kharis was looking at her with a mixture of incredulousness, anger, and curiosity. Maryn stared at him and buried her face in her hands, rubbing the bottoms of her palms on her eyes. “You punched my dad,” she said, her voice coming out a lot weaker than she intended it to. There was a lump in her throat.

 

              “He said he didn’t have anything waiting for him, Maryn. I’m not sorry.”

 

              She removed her hands from her eyes, averting her gaze from Kharis. She let the fact seep into her mind, the events of the past half-hour or so hitting her at full force. She wasn’t sure if she wanted to go back to that inn, despite the waiting parent that was probably getting into some sort of trouble despite the small room. She fidgeted with her fingers, clasping and unclasping them methodically—she didn’t have any words she felt good about offering him, so she just sighed and stewed.

 

              “Where did he go?” Kharis asked, his voice holding no concern.

 

              “I left him at the inn.”

 

              “My cloak was in there. If he gets his grubby hands on it, I’m punching him again.”

 

              That earned a small laugh from Maryn, but she still felt ragged. She heard Kharis huff, and when he spoke again, his voice sounded softer.

 

              “Not what you expected?”

 

              “That’s not it!” she said quickly, defensively. “It’s just—it’s been a while. What would you say to do your dad if he showed up right now?”

 

              “Would you punch him?” Kharis asked with a devious grin.

 

              “Probably.”

 

              “Alright then.”

 

              They fell into silence, and Maryn felt her heart lift a little bit, one side of her mouth quirking up. She felt her eyes start to water, overwhelmed, and when she rubbed at her eyes again, she felt Kharis and his cold hands take her by the wrists and stand her up with him. “Come on. We can’t sit in a grimy bar all night and feel bad about our shitty dads.”

 

              Maryn nodded. That much she could agree with, and maybe it was the little bit of alcohol she had fuzzing her mind (she had never been the best at holding hers), but now she felt a little bit more rational.

 

              “Yeah. Alright.”

 

              They walked together out of the bar, both of them just the smallest bit drunk, and Maryn grinned when they reached the door to the inn.

 

              Kharis turned to her, and he flashed a grin. “If he does anything stupid, I’m punching him again.”

 

              “ _Please_ refrain from punching my dad again. He’s old.”

 

              He shrugged, and for the briefest moment, slipped his hand into hers before letting it fall. He was worried for her, Maryn could tell, but she bumped him with her hip in reassurance.

 

              “I figure it’s time for you to meet my family, Crowe.”

 

* * *

 

When the doorknob turned with a rough noise, Murdoc whipped around instinctively, immediately putting down the bag he had been rifling through. He’d never been the best at looking innocent, and when the tall Taylvish man glowered at him from his position behind Maryn, he smiled, and approached him very normally, like a normal person would.

 

              “I heard you tried to kill my daughter,” he said cordially, extending a hand. Maryn whispered a quick and sharp “ _Dad!”_ and Kharis smiled toothily. He took Murdoc’s hand in his, and his grip was so chilly that Murdoc almost pulled back, but he shook it anyway.

 

              “That was a while ago,” Kharis said flatly, and Murdoc noted that his ears were tipped backwards. “Good to know that was one of the first things Maryn told you about.”

 

              “ _Kharis!”_ she laughed, lightly slapping his arm. “It was an important story component!”

 

              “You didn’t lead with, I don’t know, the multiple times I’ve saved your life? Or the times you’ve saved mine? None of this occurred to you?”

 

              “ _Listen—”_

Murdoc watched their bickering warily, and he thought that maybe he had an idea of what was happening between them, but he didn’t have an idea about how he felt about it.

 

              “You throw quite a punch, son,” Murdoc interrupted. Kharis turned to him and the smile dropped from his face, and he hummed in Murdoc’s general direction. He wasn’t sure how to read this man.

 

              Whatever the case, Maryn broke the silence that followed the short exchange, throwing her arms around Murdoc’s neck, burying her face into his shoulder. Murdoc wasted no time closing his arms around her, and he couldn’t help but notice how small she felt, despite the presence she demanded when she entered a room. She felt like the small child that Murdoc had embraced the last time he left from Gulterdon. She felt like Lena.

 

              When she pulled away, Murdoc thumbed away the tears that slipped down Maryn’s freckled cheeks that pushed up her eyes in the wake of her bright smile. “You should go home,” he said softly. “To see your mother.”

 

              Her face flattened, her eyes going wide. “You’ll come, right? With me?”

 

              “I can’t.”

 

              The words hung in the air for a moment, during which Murdoc wondered if he meant them. He did—he couldn’t go back to Gulterdon. That life wasn’t for him. He was afraid that if he ever saw Lena or Maryn again in that small cliffside house, he would never see the sea again.

 

              Maryn backed out of his embrace, holding her hands up in front of her. “You can’t be serious, are you?”

 

              “I am.” The words weighed his heart down.

 

              She stared directly into his eyes, a second, during which the world felt calm still, and then Murdoc could see anger suddenly tear into her body. “You _hypocrite—”_

“Maryn, listen to me—”

 

              “ _No!”_ she yelled, advancing on him, and Murdoc backed up involuntarily. “You have _no place_ to tell me to go back home where you’ve been gone longer than I have!”

 

              Silence for a heartbeat, two. Murdoc didn’t know how to explain this to his daughter. How do you explain that you can’t go home, or rather, that you don’t _want_ to?

 

              “Is this why you said there was nothing waiting for you?” she continued. “Is that what you’ve been telling yourself for all these years? Were we _nothing_ to you, _Murdoc_?” Maryn spat each word, but the last came out like venom that pumped into his blood. He could offer her nothing that would sate her, at this point.

 

              “I did tell myself that, yes,” he said, because it was the truth. He kept talking, despite the heartbroken look that came onto Maryn’s face. “It made it easier. To keep adventuring. To keep doing what I loved.”

 

              But you weren’t nothing to me, Maryn. You were everything to me. You and your mother.”

 

              When Maryn spoke again, her voice was watery, but hard, sharp. “You’re a _fucking_ liar.” She wiped at her eyes with the back of her arm, and when she dropped it, her face was steel, her lips pulled back viciously.

 

              The words that came out of Murdoc’s mouth next would haunt him. He spat them as she had done with hers, the anger in his mind overwhelming him. “You’re no different than me!” he accused, and he felt the room drop in temperature, but he had no care for it. “We both haven’t been back home in _years_ —”

 

              Out of the corner of his eye, Murdoc could see Maryn hold up a palm in Kharis’ direction. ” _Don’t._ Don’t even _begin_ to pretend we are the same. I was out looking for your sorry ass, and at least I didn’t become a shitty _drunk._ ”

 

              The tension in the air could be cut with a knife. It was utterly silent, and just before Murdoc was about to say something else—maybe an apology, he would never know—Maryn started pacing around the room, shoving things into bags and hooking them to a belt around her waist. “Enjoy the free room tonight. It’s on us.” She nodded to Kharis, who followed her example, gathering his things.

 

              Murdoc said nothing. His world was racing by, and at the same time, at a complete standstill. He watched, frozen, as his daughter spat at the floorboards before him and walked out of the door. She didn’t look back, and he lamented that the last time he saw her eyes, they were full of remorse, tears, and fury.

 

              The door slammed shut.

 

* * *

 

Kharis didn’t know what to say.

 

              He’d put a hand on Maryn’s shoulder once the door to the inn room had shut, but it didn’t feel right to hover there, so he’d let it drop. She hadn’t said a word since they’d left, and he was left following her from a considerable distance as the air around her seethed, her feet taking her to a place that Kharis couldn’t guess. To his surprise—or, maybe not, actually—they took her back to the tavern, but before she could barge in, Kharis grabbed her arm.

 

              When she turned around and looked at him, her face was red, and her eyes were watery. It made him shiver. He simply shook his head, but the figured he owed her at least a few words.

 

              “Don’t do this,” he said, feeling like his words would fall on deaf ears. “If you do, he wins.”

 

              He hated pulling that card so soon, but it seemed to work. Maryn took her arm from his grasp and harrumphed, whipping around and continuing her trek towards the docks. He’d rather her drink on the ship, where there was a limited amount of alcohol, than in a grimy bar where they would undoubtedly spend too much time and too much money. He kept a close eye on her as they made it back to _The Gull,_ but he stopped when they reached the door the captain’s quarters beneath the helm, intending to just go to his small room, but Maryn nodded her head as invitation inside.

 

              Kharis had only been in here a handful of times over three or so years, and the amount of clutter she had in her room only grew to surprise him more and more every time he came in. He took a tentative seat at a desk she had against one of the walls and watched her as she methodically sorted through papers scattered around the room, tossing certain ones to the floor. Maps, letters, wanted posters—they all shared a common name on them that made bile rise to Kharis’ throat.

 

              He watched as she threw more and more papers to the floor, and he watched as she very suddenly stopped, her hands splayed on a shelf, her shoulders shaking. Kharis made a motion to stand, but she held up a hand, just like she’d done in the inn. He hesitated, but stood up anyway, going to stand next to her in an attempt at consolidation. One of her hands suddenly took one of his, and Kharis felt relief wash over him as she turned, tears in her eyes but a smile on her face.

 

              “You should have punched him again,” she said, and despite the smile, her voice was weak and ragged, and Kharis threw an arm around her—she accepted it, and for a few minutes they stood in the captain’s quarters of a stolen ship, worthless documents piled around them, a thief crying into the shoulder of an assassin.

 

              When her shaking seemed to have slowed down, Kharis pushed her back, and the question in his eyes was answered by the certainty in hers. She would be okay, he knew that much.

 

              “What do you want to do?” he asked.

 

              Maryn laughed, and the sound felt so good to hear. “I want to sleep for so, so long,” she said, but continued, “But I also want to go home.”

 

              Kharis knit his brows. He didn’t want her doing it for the wrong reason—

 

              “Not because of him. For me. He was right about one thing, and it’s that I’ve been away from home for too long. On account of him. He wasn’t worth it, huh?”

 

              “No, not really,” Kharis agreed, and Maryn smiled again, and it looked genuine.

 

              “Alright then, Crowe. I figure it’s time for you to meet my mother.”

**Author's Note:**

> this got INCREDIBLY out of hand but yeah it was kind of fun to write from an outsider's perspective even if said outsider is an ass!


End file.
